Court overturns alcoholic director’s Condor Blanco decision...

Court overturns alcoholic director’s Condor Blanco decision


Administrator Domenic Calabretta. Picture: Hollie Adams

• The Australian
• 12:00AM August 31, 2016
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• ANTHONY KLAN
  
  Journalist
  Sydney
  @Anthony_Klan
  

ASX-listed Condor Blanco Mines has risen from the dead with its administration deemed invalid because an alcoholic director made no efforts to determine its health before he approved the appointment of the corporate doctors in the bar of a King’s Cross pub.
The NSW Supreme Court yesterday ruled the appointment of administrator Domenic Calabretta to Condor Blanco “invalid, void and of no effect”, placing the struggling company in the hands of three activist shareholders who last month ousted its highly dysfunctional former management.
The ruling comes as The Australian can reveal Mr Calabretta has been required to update the conflict of interest disclosures he filed with the ASX following his appointment to Condor Blanco.
Mr Calabretta initially had not disclosed that immediately before his appointment he had been in contact with corporate “adviser” John Kukulovski, who at the time was in negotiations with Condor’s founder in a bid to launch a legal company rejuvenation.
He also failed to disclose that he was an associate and former work colleague of Mr Kukulovski’s.
Mr Calabretta yesterday said he had updated the filings because he had been requested to do so but that he did not consider that the information needed to be disclosed in first place.
He said he had not opposed the move to oust him as administrator and would not appeal the court’s decision.
The action to remove Mr Calabretta was launched by three Condor Blanco shareholders, including Joshua Farquhar, who are likely to now sell the company shell, which could be worth about $3m.
Condor Blanco founder Glen Darby — currently in jail over an unrelated rape conviction — and short-term director Timothy Stops appointed Mr Calabretta on the evening of July 4, hours before a shareholder vote which was set to see the board removed.
The court yesterday found the administration was invalid because Mr Stops had failed to make any independent checks as to the solvency or otherwise of Condor Blanco before appointing Mr Calabretta.
Mr Stops had “simply followed blindly and unquestioningly” Darby’s claim that the company was insolvent.
The court also found Darby had acted improperly by rushing to appoint an administrator hours before the meeting, when there was no financial or legal need to do so immediately.
The court had earlier heard Mr Stops, a drinking buddy of Darby’s, had been temporarily living in Darby’s apartment when, six days before the purported administration, he was signed on as a Condor Blanco director.
The court heard Condor Blanco executives always knew how to get in touch with Mr Stops because he spent every day — “weekdays and weekends” — drinking at the Empire Hotel in Sydney’s Kings Cross.
Mr Stops could not recall whether or not he had approved the appointment of Mr Calabretta — which occurred at the Empire Hotel — because he had a “very poor memory”.
The court heard medical evidence Mr Stops was an alcoholic and used the drug ice.